TechWhirl (TECHWR-L) is a resource for technical writing and technical communications professionals of all experience levels and in all industries to share their experiences and acquire information.
For two decades, technical communicators have turned to TechWhirl to ask and answer questions about the always-changing world of technical communications, such as tools, skills, career paths, methodologies, and emerging industries. The TechWhirl Archives and magazine, created for, by and about technical writers, offer a wealth of knowledge to everyone with an interest in any aspect of technical communications.
Generally, I touch-type faster than I can navigate auto-complete. I
can think of only two situations where I've found it useful:
- when typing a long path in a command-line / terminal window
- when entering data in a field with a predefined set of values that
I'm usually or always trying to match, such as in the "category" field
of my financial software
In the latter situation, it takes longer than typing, the value is
that it eliminates errors due to typos.
I have all the auto-complete options turned off on my Droid, but if I
type space-ampersand-space in some apps it comes out as
ampersand-space-space (which might be appropriate for commas, periods,
semicolons, and colons).
"I like the trail that the Internet created. For example, I was
watching one of those Douglas Sirk movies, and I noticed that Rock
Hudson towered over everyone, and I typed in 'How tall was' and I saw
'How tall was Jesus,' and I'm like, 'Sure,' and half an hour later
you're somewhere you didn't expect to be. It doesn't work that same
way in books, does it? Even if you have an encyclopedia, the trail
isn't that crazy. I like that aspect of it."—David Sedaris
2011/7/29 Rédacteur en chef <editorialstandards -at- gmail -dot- com>:
> 'Scuse me... I found this can of worms and thought I'd just dump it
> here... :-)
>
> Perhaps this is a survey question?
>
> Cognitive load was mentioned in another thread today.
>
> Many interfaces now include predictive completion that anticipates the
> word or phrase that you are trying to type. (MadCap calls it
> IntelliSense).
>
> Do you like it?
>
> Do you use it?
>
> Have you encountered versions of it that you prefer over others? Or
> versions that you detest more... ?
>
> My reaction is annoyance. It always seems to guess wrong, and since
> I'm touch-typing and looking at the screen (not at my keyboard),
> there's this annoying disturbance to the flow. It makes me stumble if
> it's anything other than the exact word I'm typing. Only rarely, and
> for lengthy phrases, is it quicker than just typing the complete
> word/phrase. So I shut off auto-completion whenever I encounter it.
> EXCEPT for browser address/search fields, and forms, where it seems
> useful.
>
> Is it age?
>
> Perhaps I'd appreciate it if my phone had a virtual keyboard, instead
> of a slide-out real one?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Create and publish documentation through multiple channels with Doc-To-Help.
Choose your authoring formats and get any output you may need. Try
Doc-To-Help, now with MS SharePoint integration, free for 30-days. http://www.doctohelp.com
---
You are currently subscribed to TECHWR-L as archive -at- web -dot- techwr-l -dot- com -dot-
